Study, meditation

8:00^am > Study

The days without collection, so five days a week, we begin to study in the morning from 6:00^am till 10:00^am and in the afternoon from 1:00^pm till 5:00^pm In fact as we are in a studying place except different tasks we constantly study.

We especially study the dhamma teachings. To us, there is nothing more important, because it is that which make us understand the advantages of our virtuous life, what is truly reality and how to end with everything that make us suffer respecting at best all our background.

To have a good general knowledge we also study some general subjects such as grammar, mathematics or geography.

In the morning, we study with a nun; a teacher qualified to hand the dhamma teachings down to us. Our teacher is also the mother superior of the xxxconvent. She makes us learn by heart each text and explain us in detail each point, until we have completely understood.

10:00^am > Meditation

We meditate a little during the day but not more than ten or fifteen minutes.

« It is hard to stay concentrated on your belly movements. I manage to meditate for ten seconds but after that I think about lots of things. »

« I also can’t succeed in concentrating as I have to. I think to lots of things I like. But it is told that the more you meditate the less thoughts you have. »

« When I close my eyes, I immediately want to sleep. But it is not possible, because we have a straight back and you can’t lean against something; if you fall asleep, you fall! Sometimes I have too many thoughts to be able to meditate. Then when I stay sitting without doing any movement breathing quietly at least it calms me down and I have a rest. »

Our elders tell that it is normal not to succeed in meditating from the start.

Even if it is not easy, it is good to practice from time to time. When you want to meditate seriously you can go in meditation centre where it’s the only thing you do all day.